The Critical Role Tech Collaboration Will Play in the Future Success of CMOs

Budgets for digital marketing efforts across the board are increasing again this year in large companies, growing another 8% with no signs of stopping. That has big long-term implications for what will be required for success by Chief Marketing Officers.

Marketing’s influence over technology decisions and resources has never been higher. Soon, marketing departments will have bigger tech budgets than CIOs. Big businesses report that 25% of their annual marketing budget was spent on digital efforts in 2014; and out of those companies, 51% are increasing it as we speak.

MarTech has grown in a number of areas, including CRM, digital marketing, database marketing, marketing automation, customer analytics, mobile marketing and ecommerce–just to name a few. Digital marketing has experienced major growth, with smart companies now viewing marketing and digital marketing as one cohesive strategy rather than two separate entities.

Marketing has become primarily responsible for choosing and managing marketing service providers at 83% of companies and technology provider decision maker at 71% of companies. Marketing’s reach extends to software, as well, with 75% of companies reporting that marketing controls the budget for consulting and design of marketing-related software. Additionally, 47% of companies report that marketing controls the budget for SaaS purchases, while 43% responded that its marketing budget extends to external hosting of technology to run marketing-related software.

Talking $$$

A large part of the shift in responsibility comes from the fact that websites are now more than destinations to simply learn more about a company or product. Instead, they have become (or at least, should be) revenue-generating machines.

Over the years, the responsibility of creating and maintaining those machines has fallen on the shoulders of marketing teams. Growing targeted advertising capabilities and the rise of mobile marketing have only reinforced their marketing department’s control over the digital space.

“Fueling this trend is the use of programmatic media, which allows marketers to target the audience they want and automate bidding rules for ads based on the business value they deliver. Nevertheless, the survey suggested that in 2015, digital advertising will share its top ranking with mobile marketing,” Gartner announced in a press release.

Couple the growth in targeted advertising with the fact that company websites need to have a strong focus on customer experience, and it’s easy to understand why marketing has its eye–and budget–set on refining the experience for end users. “Customer experience is also considered by many companies to be the top innovation project, just edging out product innovation,” says Jake Sorofman, research director at Gartner in a statement.

So what does this mean for IT? Well, the future of IT will necessitate more collaboration with marketing as the department brings in more technology. The two operations and their leaders will increasingly work hand in hand.

Perfectly-executed digital marketing executive searches will become increasingly critical, and marketing operations will need to be led by a tech-savvy CMO who understands both back-end technical infrastructure and practical applications for the latest digital tools and tactics. On the other hand, IT operations increasingly need to be filled at all levels with experts who have an affinity for business and can effectively communicate with marketers about their needs and capabilities.

Together this will not only improve the success of marketing, but of traditional IT objectives as well. Digital security will be improved as technologically competent marketers take the reigns of the vast amount of consumer and third-party data coming at them on a regular basis. And risk management will be easier as policies become streamlined, technologies are standardized, and internal communication is improved.

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